One training technique frequently used by people, especially fighters, is to strike targets held by trainers. Such targets are usually hand-held mitts often called focus mitts. Such mitt based training, especially in fields such as boxing and martial arts, has always been hard on the shoulders of the trainer. Indeed, it is often said that holding focus mitts can be as demanding as striking them. Rounds and rounds of focus mitt strikes with heavy punchers can injure the trainer, especially less experienced trainers or older trainers with age related upper extremity joint, tendon, and ligament deterioration.
Notably, boxing training with mitts has become a very popular type of fitness training for non-combatants. However, most general personal fitness trainers have not built up tolerance to repeated blows to the hands, elbows, and shoulder joints as those who have trained boxers for years in combative sports. Consequently, personal fitness trainers who may not have much experience with mitt training but want to offer it as something new for their clients are at risk of injury, especially smaller trainers working with large clients.
What is needed is a training device that minimizes the impact of punches by absorbing or transferring the associated inertia to something other than the trainer/trainee. Such a training device would allow older trainers and inexperienced trainers to train people longer as the physical impact on such trainer is minimized. Similarly, such a training device also allows for the non-combatant personal fitness trainees to push for significant anaerobic and aerobic conditioning during mitt training without injury to upper body extremities (i.e. hands, wrists, elbows, and shoulders).
Another issue involves the trainer's hand speed. The faster the trainer the better the training session will be as the faster the trainee will need to be (or become). Additionally, when using devices such as focus mitts it is important that the trainer not merely to hold them but to actively “feed” them into the combination of punches with visual clues to prompt a desired response from the trainee. Prior art focus mitts on the market do not provide significant improvements in both. For example, prior art focus mitts do not amplify trainer hand speed. Similarly, prior art devices such as the “Ball on the Stick” design disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 8,777,631, suffers from the defect of not being a planar target which makes signaling the proper punch combinations more difficult thereby forcing the trainer to “call out” additional audio clues such as “hook, uppercut, straight” to indicate what type of punch to throw. Thus, what is needed is a device that amplifies trainer hand speed and allows for trainer signaling to trainee.
In most contact sports, such as boxing, speed and building defensive reaction time of the combatants is a primary goal. Defensive Reaction time is the time from the point the trainee reacts with a defensive move to counter the offensive move of the trainer. Notably, the time it takes a trainer's hand to travel from a neutral position to a striking point (trainer's hand speed) determines the effective defensive reaction time needed from the trainee. In boxing, for example, as a trainer ages his hand speed naturally slows which limits how fast such trainer can push a fighter's defensive reaction time. What is needed is a device that extends a trainer's reach thereby amplifying a trainer's hand speed and ability to “feed” the target to the fighter during training. Such a feature would also allow such trainer to reach areas of the fighter that would otherwise require foot movement, movement which also significantly slows with aging over time.
Another problem with prior art mitts is that they require the trainer to be closer to the fighter than typically desired. What is needed is a device that enhances the trainer's ability to “feed” the target while placing more distance between the trainer/target/mitt and the fighter. Such a feature further stresses the importance of proper distance between fighter and target, how to evade, and further learn the need to get “inside”.
Yet another issue relates to feedback to the trainee such a peak punching force, max punching speed, punches per round, and cumulative punching force per round or over multiple rounds. Such would provide clear and objective training benchmarks that the trainee would strive to improve. Consequently, what is needed is a training device that provides the fighter with feedback to signal a performance level.
The training device disclosed in this document addresses at least the problems identified above.